A salsa made with the best flavors of summer - bell pepper, tomatoes, cucumber, chilies, zucchini and corn - nicely seasoned and tossed with a quality creamy Italian dressing.

Summer Vegetable Salsa

Okay. Question.

Is this a salsa? You know, like meant to be eaten with chips? Or as a condiment for grilled or pan seared proteins?

Or, is it a dip, solely meant to be scooped up on a chip?

Or, is it a salad? Meant to be eaten on its own?

A tomato and cucumber salad with red onion, olives and feta tossed in a Greek-style dressing.

(Almost Greek-Style) Tomato, Cucumber and Olive Salad

I'm always up for making different kinds of salads using tomatoes, cucumbers, or both!

I saw this Horiatiki Salata aka Hearty Greek Salad on the America's Test Kitchen channel on Roku one day recently and thought it looked so good I needed to make it right away!

Only thing is, I didn't have everything on hand that it called for though, so I had to make some adjustments, which is why I say this is an "almost" Greek-style salad.

A classic tomato salad with sweet onion and cucumber and a nicely balanced vinegar based dressing.

Cucumber Tomato and Onion Salad

I love cucumber, tomato and onion salad combinations and I eat them constantly over these hot summers, so I am always playing around with them.

It's pretty amazing how subtle changes in the same basic ingredients can completely alter the texture and taste in them and the dressing on this one is a great balance between tart and sweet to me.

Cucumbers and sweet onions, marinated in a slightly sweetened white wine and rice vinegar dressing with mustard seeds and tossed with fresh tomatoes.

Marinated Cucumber and Tomato Salad

• Seeing as it's summer
• That it's hotter than hot right now, and
• I'm certainly getting my fill of all the cooling foods I can right now

Here's yet another cucumber and tomato salad to add to the collection!

This version was inspired by one that I ran across in Paula Deen's At the Southern Table cookbook. It was a little bit different from the typical cucumber and tomato salad and interesting enough that it had me curious, so I thought I'd give it a try... with my own adaptations, of course!

A creamy tomato-based stew with shrimp, crawfish and crab and served over hot, steamed rice.

Seafood Pan Roast

Several years back, I was looking through a Martha Foose cookbook, Screen Doors and Sweet Tea, that contained a recipe for what was called a seafood pan roast. Since The Cajun and I don't eat out much, this was an unfamiliar dish for me.

At the time, I couldn't find much about it around the internet either and even today there still isn't much out there. I went ahead and made it, but with no photos to let me know if I was anywhere on track let's just say mine didn't turn out quite right. With the cost of seafood, I abandoned it to experiment a bit more thoroughly another time.

Fresh tomatoes, air fryer roasted with onions and whole garlic cloves tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper and blended. Perfect for pasta dishes but use anywhere you would use diced tomatoes or puree them for a more sauced version.

Air Fryer Roasted Tomatoes

As of this writing, Fall has "officially" arrived, though it does take a while to effect any change here in the Deep South. I mean, as we speak, there's a potential hurricane threatening the Gulf Coast!

Regardless, one thing is for certain, we're getting to the end of local and backyard tomato season.

Though he loves the sauces and casseroles I make with them, The Cajun is not a big fan of fresh, raw tomatoes and he wouldn't dream of a tomato sandwich! Me, I love them and I enjoy them with many meals, including simply sliced with a little salt and pepper, even alongside my breakfast eggs.

Cheese Delights - Broiled Open-Faced Tomato and Cheese Sandwich

An open-faced, broiled tomato and cheese sandwich with bacon and fresh basil.

Cheese Delights

One day, when I was sharing my broiled tomatoes on the Facebook page, Cheryl, one of the readers there, was reminded of an open-faced tomato sandwich her grandmother used to make. She called them Cheese Delights.

You can find a variety of open-faced tomato and cheese sandwich recipes around the net, and while they have different preparations and some with a variation in ingredients, you'll primarily find the ingredients to contain at least:

Fresh, juicy tomatoes and garden cucumbers, paired with purple onion and dressed with a local honey and mustard vinaigrette, finished with torn basil, fresh from the garden.

Tomato and Cucumber Salad with Honey Mustard Vinaigrette

Y'all know that I love me some fresh summer cucumbers and juicy, seasonal tomatoes and as salads go, I mostly just toss them with a mix of vinegar and sugar and call it a day. I do love that whole sweet and sour thing and that's the way I combine them most often.

Sometimes it's just simply cucumbers with onions, mostly sweet Vidalias, because it is the season for them too after all, but sometimes a sharp, purple onion is in order instead.

A tomato and cucumber salad, dressed lightly with a seasoned, mayonnaise-based dressing and lots of crumbled bacon!

Bacon, Cucumber and Tomato Salad

I didn't have nearly as many tomatoes or cucumbers this year. Early on, in the spring, they did great, but then by June we had constant, heavy rainstorms - which, by the way haven't stopped - intertwined with heat indexes in the triple digits - that haven't stopped either - and the tomatoes really suffered.

Guess I'm either going to have to start from seed so I can plant earlier, or else just forget about it and hit the fresh market weekly for my tomato fix!

My early tomatoes - Deep South Dish on Instagram

Chopped cabbage, smothered down with the trinity of vegetables, ground sausage and tomatoes.

Smothered Cabbage with Sausage and Tomato

Well hey y'all - wow, it's a new year already... Happy New Year! Okay we're more than a week into it now, but what can I say? I've been busy with life.

Mercy was it cold enough this January for everybody though?

I know that in comparison to the rest of the country, here on the Gulf Coast we had it pretty easy. No snow, but the cold rain that rolled in right when the temps started dropping sure would have made for a pretty blanket of snow. We did have three nights in a row where things were freezing, two of which were hard freezes, and with the high winds, daytime temps weren't a whole lot better, so for us here in the Deep South, it was cold!

My interpretation of Aglio e Olio, spaghetti, sauteed in olive oil and garlic, tossed with fresh herbs, red pepper flakes and parmesan cheese, and finished with melted tiny tomatoes.

Spaghetti with Olive Oil, Garlic and Melted Tiny Tomatoes

I cannot imagine living my life without pasta. I hope the day never comes that I have to!

I try not to go overboard with it, of course, and yes, like everybody else, I try to incorporate some of the healthier pastas into my diet here and there too. Some of it is quite good, like this Dreamfields brand {affil link} (love!).

Southern Style Skillet Ratatouille - a simple stew of diced vegetables, made with bacon drippings, the Trinity of Southern Cooking, zucchini and summer squash, tomato, eggplant, okra and fresh herbs.

Southern Style Skillet Ratatouille

Most folks these days seem to associate ratatouille with the Disney movie of the same name, and many may only know it from that. It actually is a real Mediterranean dish, most closely associated with France and said to have originated in Nice. The word perhaps comes from "touiller" and translates to mean something akin to "toss or stir."

Traditionally ratatouille is simply zucchini and tomatoes, with peppers, garlic and onion, sometimes sliced, sometimes cut into chunks. Somewhere along the way, eggplant was included, and though it wasn't always a part of the traditional dish, it's pretty much expected these days. I decided to make it with a dice of a variety of summer vegetables that we love in the south.

Oven roasting intensifies the flavor of many vegetables, giving a browned and often crisped exterior, against a creamy, soft feel inside. It's one of my favorite ways to cook them, and they're a perfect addition to your table any time of the year.

Roasted Zucchini, Onions, Peppers and Tomatoes

It's mid-October and that means that we just finished up with "America's Largest Block Party" down here on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. If you have a classic car, or even if you just love them, but you've never been, I don't know why! Put it on your calendar and get on down here next year and check it out. It's quite an event, there are beautiful cars everywhere, and it always starts the first weekend in October every year, continuing on through the next Sunday.

The weather has been perfect for it too, as it usually is for this event. By October, things have usually cooled off a tad here in the Deep South finally - mid-80s during the day and low to mid-60s at night. There was one night there on the ball field with No. 1 Grandson that I was literally shivering in a t-shirt and jeans! Humidity has not been too bad either and frankly that's really the biggest factor around here because even when the temperature is up, if the humidity is down it's pleasant, and that it has been. Really gorgeous weather.

A skillet meal made from the best of summer veggies - squash, zucchini, bell pepper, green beans, Vidalia onions and tomatoes, with red potatoes and fresh garden herbs and the addition of some pan-seared fresh wild-caught Gulf shrimp.

Garden Vegetable Skillet with Shrimp

I get strange cravings, and most times, they're not at all what you'd expect in the way of a craving.

I get very strong cravings out of the blue for beef. For McDonald's french fries. Or their iced coffee. Homemade chicken noodle soup and creamy Chicken and Noodles. Egg drop soup from the local Chinese restaurant. And vegetables, in general. It was that way in my pregnancy - I didn't crave sweets, or odd combinations. I craved a meat and three dinner!

Fresh tomatoes, roughly chopped and marinated in a herb vinaigrette. Serve as is, spoon over a mixed garden salad, use as a garnish with grilled meats, or spoon over individual plates of plain shredded lettuce.

Marinated Tomatoes

With the big move to our new home, I planted a little late this year, and just picked the first of my homegrown tomatoes off the vine in my backyard. They will soon be part of my annual summer ritual.

This year, I was short on time to dig a garden or set up raised beds like before, so I just did a few containers of tomatoes in 5 gallon buckets and planted some herbs, beans and cucumbers right outside the patio door.

A homemade spaghetti meat sauce made with fresh tomatoes and ground beef.

Homemade Fresh Tomato Spaghetti Meat Sauce

There is not a thing wrong with shortcut spaghetti sauce - I use a semi-homemade version of one myself most of the time. It's a quicker version that takes canned pasta sauce and jazzes it up a bit to give it homemade flavor. I've been making it that way forever, and it's a great recipe when you want a good sauce in a hurry. My husband loves it, and that's good enough for me.

Fresh garden tomatoes, seasoned with salt, pepper, Cajun seasoning, fresh basil and brown sugar, in a casserole made with bacon, butter and the trinity of Deep South veggies - onion, bell pepper and celery - topped with shredded cheddar cheese and buttery cracker crumbs.

Tomato Casserole

I recently shared a recipe from one of my round-up lists of fresh tomato recipes over on our Best Southern Recipes Facebook page and Phyllis, one of our readers there, mentioned in comments that she was still waiting on tomatoes in the area where she lived.

Tomato pie, using simple fresh ingredients - juicy tomatoes and fresh herbs, layered in a flaky pie crust, with sweet onion and cheese. Dress the top with the traditional mayonnaise and cheese mixture, and you've got a classic southern tomato pie.

Classic Southern Tomato Pie

Yes! It really is still summer, I swear. If you don't believe me, c'mon down to the Deep South, and I'll show you what heat and humidity are like in September along the Gulf Coast. We were at the Biloxi Seafood Festival this Saturday with the grandkids, and it was as hot as it has been all summer, though we did have a nice cold front pass through Sunday.

Temps have been down in the mid-80s with low humidity for a few days and it has been just gorgeous. Only those of us who live our lives in the South understand that is considered "nice and cool."

A versatile and super easy pasta sauce made from garden fresh tomatoes, pictured here with a three cheese tortellini and garnished with freshly grated Parmesan cheese and fresh parsley.

Fresh Tomato Pasta Sauce

We're already heading halfway into the month of July, so I guess we're getting pretty close to that final lap of summer, for which many of us will be grateful! I don't know about y'all, but I'm sure praying for a cooler fall and winter this year than last because it's been hotter than the hinges of Hades pretty much everywhere this summer.

Unfortunately, though, that also means that we'll be not long before saying goodbye to our favorite summer produce too, so get 'em in while ya can! {Southern Sidebar: Don't you just love how some of us southerners can butcher up the English language with a sentence like that? The grammar police must really love those of us who write on sites like this. Relax. We just like to write how we talk is all.}

Fresh squash and tomatoes are paired with Vidalia onion and sweet bell peppers, topped with cheese and buttered bread crumbs and baked.

Squash Creole

Vidalia onions, okra, vine ripe tomatoes and green beans, freshly shucked corn, butter beans, southern peas and sweet bell peppers, yellow crookneck squash, zucchini and garden fresh cucumbers. I just love the veggies of summer. Have you gotten your fill yet?